Discover the best time of year, based on historical climate, temperature, and precipitation.
The best weather in Burlington is from May, July, September. — consistent weather climate
🌦Humid
| Score | 11 | 12 | 13 | 27 | 80 | 75 | 76 | 76 | 82 | 47 | 12 | 10 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Climate | Polar | Polar | Polar | Cold | Mild | Humid | Humid | Humid | Humid | Cold | Cold | Polar |
| Temperature | -9–-1°C | -10–0°C | -5–4°C | 2–11°C | 9–19°C | 14–23°C | 18–27°C | 17–26°C | 14–22°C | 8–15°C | 1–7°C | -4–2°C |
| Feels like | -14–-6°C | -14–-4°C | -10–0°C | -2–8°C | 6–18°C | 13–24°C | 19–28°C | 18–27°C | 13–22°C | 5–13°C | -4–4°C | -9–-2°C |
| Precipitation | 74mm 14 days | 65mm 12 days | 75mm 12 days | 102mm 14 days | 80mm 10 days | 122mm 12 days | 110mm 11 days | 111mm 11 days | 83mm 8 days | 121mm 14 days | 87mm 13 days | 87mm 15 days |
| Sunshine | 3.8h ☀︎ 41% | 5.3h ☀︎ 50% | 6.7h ☀︎ 56% | 7.3h ☀︎ 54% | 10.1h ☀︎ 68% | 10.8h ☀︎ 70% | 11.8h ☀︎ 78% | 11.3h ☀︎ 81% | 9.7h ☀︎ 78% | 6.4h ☀︎ 58% | 4.6h ☀︎ 48% | 3.2h ☀︎ 36% |
| Wind | SW · 20 km/h | SW · 21 km/h | W · 20 km/h | W · 20 km/h | SW · 18 km/h | SW · 17 km/h | SW · 15 km/h | S · 16 km/h | S · 16 km/h | S · 19 km/h | SW · 21 km/h | SW · 21 km/h |
| Humidity (%) | 72% | 70% | 68% | 69% | 69% | 72% | 74% | 75% | 75% | 75% | 73% | 74% |
| Day length | 9.3h | 10.5h | 12.0h | 13.5h | 14.8h | 15.5h | 15.1h | 14.0h | 12.5h | 11.0h | 9.6h | 8.9h |
This ten-day festival fills downtown venues and the Lake Champlain waterfront with jazz, funk, and world music acts each…
Held in mid-July at Waterfront Park, this festival gathers dozens of Vermont breweries for tastings along the shore of L…
Standard New England travel wisdom reserves Burlington for crisp September foliage or midsummer lake breezes, but May is the city's true sweet spot—offering luminous ten-hour sunlit days and effortless elbow room before summer crowds descend.
Perched on the eastern shore of Lake Champlain, Burlington is an anomaly: the smallest city to anchor any American state, powered entirely by green energy and animated by a dense, walkable college-town energy. Most visitors reflexively target late summer or the golden blaze of autumn, assuming northern Vermont requires waiting out the cold. In doing so, they miss the moment the city genuinely exhales. When spring catches fire along the lake in May, downtown belongs to those who live there, the light lingers late over the Adirondacks across the water, and the entire city wakes up without the traffic, packed patios, and lodging surcharges of peak season.
If you ask a meteorologist to judge the calendar strictly on a dashboard, September edges ahead on ambient warmth. But travel is not a weather station. September brings bus tours, leaf-peeping caravans, and packed sidewalks along Church Street Marketplace. May, by contrast, gives you virtually the same balmy conditions with an entirely different spirit. The campus population at the University of Vermont begins to thin, outdoor seating spills out along brick walkways, and the city enters its quietest, most generous rhythm of the year.
The days are remarkably long, offering over ten hours of bright sunshine. Lake Champlain is still too brisk for an easy swim, but the lakeside paths at Waterfront Park are clear, the breeze off the water is refreshing rather than biting, and you will not have to wait for a table anywhere. It is Burlington at its most authentic: relaxed, progressive, green, and completely unhurried.
Summer in Burlington is intoxicating, but you will share it with everyone who had the same idea. June opens with the Burlington Discover Jazz Festival, when the waterfront and downtown stages hum with live sets, brass bands, and street performers. The city's pulse quickens, temperatures climb into the pleasant low twenties, and the waterfront turns into a shared outdoor living room.
By July and August, Burlington hits peak capacity. July is the busiest month on the calendar, capped by the Vermont Brewers Festival at Waterfront Park, where crowds gather right at the shoreline to sample local pours against the backdrop of the lake. Days are warm and full of light, reaching afternoon highs where taking a dip off North Beach or lounging on the rocky outcrops of Oakledge Park is the only rational plan.
The trade-off is friction. Parking tightens, waterfront spots fill by midday, and lodging rates reflect the crush. If you want energy, festival programming, and warm water, summer delivers—just know you are experiencing Burlington at its most commercial and least serene.
September has undeniably lovely air. The humidity of midsummer drops away, the light turns golden, and early foliage begins tinging the ridgelines across Chittenden County. But you pay for that polish in crowds and company. It is peak travel season across Vermont, and Burlington functions as the primary staging ground for travelers driving the state's mountain corridors. The city feels hurried, booked up, and self-conscious.
October is when the weather turns unpredictable. While the first week often delivers legendary color, the temperature drops rapidly as the month matures, accompanied by sudden, cold rainstorms that strip the trees bare. By mid-October, the apparent temperature feels barely above freezing on raw afternoons, and the daylight shrinks noticeably. Unless your heart is set on catching peak foliage through a windshield, the physical comfort of being outdoors in October is vastly overrated compared to late spring.
Winter in Burlington is serious business, shaped by arctic winds shearing across Lake Champlain. November brings gray skies, stripped branches, and sleet-heavy precipitation that keeps life indoors. December sees a brief resurgence of crowds—drawn by holiday shopping under the illuminated canopies of Church Street Marketplace and skiers using the city as an urban base camp—even as the wind chill sinks below freezing.
January and February are bitter. Wind howling off the lake makes extended strolls along the water a test of endurance, with apparent temperatures routinely sitting well below zero. For winter sports lovers who want good food and craft beer after a day in the mountains, it works well; for a city break focused on wandering, it is punishing.
March and April are northern New England's infamous mud season. Snow melts into slurry, April is damp and chilly, and the city is waiting for the ground to dry out. Until the thaw finishes and May arrives, Burlington keeps its coat buttoned tightly to the chin.